With Day 2 of the WJC in the books, it was a good time to take stock of how the teams are faring so far. With this post we will take a look at the bad, the 6 teams at the bottom of the standings, to see what will be needed to get back into medal contention.
 
Canada Black

After dropping the first to their rival Canada club, Canada Black followed up with back to back to back losses to Sweden. They are currently leading the tournament in goals allowed so will need to look to shore up their defensive play if they hope to string together some wins together. PeanutButter Zamboni will need to continue to try and carry this team on his back until they can figure out how to limit shots. Despite his 3.97 GAA his save percentage is a respectable .907, which is illustrative of just how many shots this team has been allowing which is currently averaging well over 40 shots a game allowed.

Norway

Norway has had a rough start to the tournament and they are going to have to figure out how to start finding the back of the net. They also had a rough start with the schedule facing off against two of the top current teams in Czechia and Finland in four of their first five. They are the lowest scoring team in the tournament with Norway being held to one or less goals in 3 of 5 to start. Peyton Campeau will be a player who needs to step up after being held pointless despite a great J season with Ottawa where he put up 78 points. It will be interesting to see how this team fares when they match up against some of the struggling teams.

Ratvia

In their 4 games so far, Ratvia has dropped both games to the British Isles and split so far with Canada Red. While their top line of Boyka III, Science and Samedi has been productive, accounting for 58% of the teams’ goals scored it just hasn’t been enough. They currently have a minus 6 goal differential and much of it can be attributed to the back end. While the D seem to be allowing high quality scoring chances the actual shot volume isn’t that crazy, averaging 33 shots against per game. The goalies here seemed to have struggled out of the gates though with Fortezza having a .859 save percentage and his counterpart Solberg slightly better at .881. If either of those goalies start to play up to their ability Ratvia could sneak back into real contention at this early stage in the tournament

World

World needs scoring and seems to have picked up a bit in the last two games. Despite averaging only 2 goals a game through the first two games they’ve followed up with 3 and 5 goals contests in their next two. While Czechia and Rhine are looking like medal favorites they aren’t getting high quality scoring chances despite the shot numbers they’ve been achieving. Popovics has also had a rougher start to the tournament with an .895 save percentage which looks much improved in the past 2 contests. I expect that trend to continue but again, this team will need to score more than 2-3 a game even with improved play from the netminder.

United States White

The exact same sentiment expressed for Team World applies to United States White through the first two games at least. In fact, the only thing really separating the two is that the US White won in the shootout in the matchup between the two squads. In the 1st two games scoring was the issue here and 2 veterans who look to lead had been held quiet at the start of the tournament. May O’Nase and Kobe Frobe simply needed to play better. May O’Nase had a remarkable 115 points this past season in the J and Frobe with a great 77 points on Maine. This tournament the pair has combined for 1 assist in those 2 games. The good news for United States White is that both seemed to have woken up in the past 3 recent games adding another 6 points combined during those games. If their top end scoring can continue to play at a high level, they may find themselves closer to the top of the table than the bottom.

Canada Red

Perfectly balanced as all things should be. Thanos would love this team, 2-2, 12 goals scored to 12 allowed, hell the scores are almost balanced too. A 5-2 win and a 5-2 loss, A 4-2 win and a 3-1 loss. 118 shots for (29.5 a game) and 107 shots against (26.75 a game). Even their scoring is balanced with 6 forwards all 3 points and above with only 1 forward above 4 points. This is a team that if they get a bit more from their D and goalies or can get a few bounces they go from .500 to contention real quick, but any regression from offense, defense or goaltending could push this team farther down the standing without really blowing any games.


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